The Legend of Lyrics
by Hountainchain Cat
Summary: Dark clouds are gathering above Midchilda and the ancient past is walking once more among the lives of men. Lost Logia were just the beginning. Now meet those who've helped in making them, as their strange destinies entangle with the lives of our heroes.
1. Chapter 1

**The Age of Wonder**

**The Legend of Lyrics**

**The lost past**

The chaos was all around them, shifting in the strands of nether cracks of tortured skies. The worlds were dying, ripped apart by the violent torrents of uncontrollable magic that consumed all like a bursting flame. He was standing on the top of a devastated ridge, pulled from the ground by unimaginable forces that raged below. His face was somehow sad, but smiling miserably with a sour smile of a tiered man, which was like an insult to his greatest achievement. Three shades of dark and red were present within his reach. However they seemed somehow distant from his brooding, silent stare that wondered around this failing world that was once so proud and beautiful and strong without compare.

The world's shards began to ascend and veins of black nether were becoming wide open wounds that were telling the watcher of unspeakable terrors beyond their dark, pulping gates. He knew to where they lead. To a wretched place he himself was once …

Another figure soared from the skies and blocked his view on all of that exquisite game of light and shades, only to be forced to look in eyes that he despised greater that the deepest scars of creeping darkness. Those eyes of vivid blue that had once stricken painful emotions into his heart and soul were now flooded with angry tears, filled with fear and disappointment. She, for it was a girl that not jet reached her full bloom, was riding the withering winds on her snow-white wings of weaven magic, her long staff of gold and pearl sparkling with hidden danger, ready to strike at him at any moment.

… _How sad, _he thought_, that he will never see her in full bloom. Non-the-less, what must be done, must be done at once and without hesitation on better times that are never meant to be._

She spoke: "This is as far as you will watch your madness, you …" Her voice deserted her for a moment, swallowed by a fit of sadness, but then she composed herself again and began anew, her gaze even more dreadful than before: "This is as far as you will watch this foul end, you traitor! I swear I will kill you!

"I know you'd try eventually," he laughed at her sorrowfully: "But this is nor your time nor space in which you'd soar, like a bird, ever so free from the strains of the living. This here …" he made a gesture to everything around him: "This here is my world now not yours! I conceived it just to mock your petty little wings, I killed thousands to see your tears … And here they are at last!" There was no happiness in his words. Hollow they sounded in the midst of twisting calls of doom.

Her eyes were crying, jet her tears dried before they reached her tight shut lips, before they reached _him_. At this time, he was already unreachable. He prayed for her cherry lips to crack and bleed on the heat of his withering madness. At that thought, his face was stretched into a foul snaring grimace that reminded her of a rabies infested wolf. He took his long blade of two dividing ends back into his right arm and pointed it towards her chest. It was snaring at her with its insane yaw of metal-born teeth, hoping to bite trough her soft pale skin into her flesh, hot from anger and life. Her lips spread into an expression of loosened hatred and she finally said the words he was waiting for so long: "Die monster!"

"My pleasure … But not just jet I won't. I have to witness the birth of this frightened new world in which I'm afraid, there is no place for you or your kind. So I must say with great hesitation and regret in mind, that it is you who must die instead of me … Or would you like all of this nether to creep uncontrolled on those who cannot weave their own wings … But then again, you would probably liked that wouldn't you!?"

The space around him shook in awe when a burst of light divided the air and clashed into his ridge, which kneeled before it with an avalanche of rolling rocks that fell down into the river of twisting shapes of light and shade. Whatever power have that burst held it was not enough. His shape stood unchallenged on the remnants of the cliff.

"The magic you possess will not suffice my dear little witch," he purred into her face, "Face it, you cannot erase the inevitable now, not if you were god itself if it would ever existed!"

A strange howl penetrated into their ears and left them both with different emotions.

"Did you hear that? The demons are coming. Jet just another sign that you should be better off dead than alive."

His warning came too late. A dark image, neither true and neither false, came diving from above like a screaming shadow of a great bird of prey. The girl was left in shock of the revelation, because she knew they were always a vanguard for even greater storms of horrors than mere shades that tried to reap trough heavy cloth of reality onto this collapsing plane.

Another shape, white as her wings, appeared on the skies and pounced at the damned apparition, so that it reared and screamed in fear and disbelief. It was a great beast of white and gray, a sphinx of great white wings and long locks of silk and silver that fell behind her pointy cat ears and onto her proud gray back. She was the girl's guardian and keeper, a beast that could face even demons.

"Hoooo?" he opened his mouth in false astonishment, "So you let the beasts do your dirty work now?"

"She's more of a person that you will ever be!" the girl threw at him.

"I bet she is, but still, one like her will change nothing, you still have to die you know."

He pounced. His feet flew from the ground like on a spring and the blade bit into a silver barrier that formed itself around the girl, but to no avail. His blade cut deep, breaking the protection with ease and sent the caster into the swirling shadows below, only to hold back a wave of intense magical stream that bashed his master flying even higher in the dense hot air.

Sphinx was trying to help, but one of the silent dark shapes still standing on the ridge draw its long crimson sword and she stopped at once. The three were too much of an opponent, even for her and her mistress.

A spatial barrier of deep purple shades erupted before him and he raised his free hand to stop it with his own. It was like stopping a raging wave and it decorated his arm with dark burns and painful redness. He grinned in pain but did not stop until the dark magic around him tried to swallow him whole. Then he retreated to a higher point and stood there, his heavy sword leaning over his head. He swung it at the exploding barrier and cut it wide open with a sound of reeling magical energies screaming in his head like tortured souls. The barrier vanished and she appeared again, visually tiered.

"You tried to lock me in your little grasp of pain didn't you? Didn't anyone told you not to use someone's own methods against them, or have you forgotten? It was I who perfected that method! Besides, it would only work on some ordinary chaps to be locked away in one's barrier. I suppose it cannot be helped, let me show you the real thing, but the barrier just won't do …" He waited on purpose, talking like an idiot, waiting for her to recover for he wanted her to witness his final blow at her fullest.

The world was at its limit and the last grips of gravity were dissipating. With every passing moment there was less air to breathe and more darkness in the sky.

He jumped for the last time, falling towards her with his sword gapping like some beast's yaws.

The brilliant light and darkness of two colliding powers was seen for miles, and when they finally went soft again, he found himself impaled on her staff and her, struck by the sharpness of his blade beneath her ribs. The blood was everywhere.

"You'll die, monster," she spoke softly for the very last time.

"So will you," he whispered in her ear, her straw colored hair tingling gently on his face: "But you are wrong. I will remain and watch the world be reborn … and someday … someday in the unforeseen future, where no one will know of such magic and wonder, I shall be reborn as a monster you hated so much, only to watch over the fulfillment of my wishes you sought so hard to prevent."

Sphinx, bound to the girl's soul fell from the sky and he started laughing like mad, his screams echoed in the lone wasteland as he too succumbed to his wound and fell in silence.

Three shapes of crimson red came and went, carrying with them the remnants of their master. The raging chaos engulfed their crimson shapes.

The unknown war was over and the destruction of the worlds came to past. The wounds of time and space healed and the creeping nether subsided in the shadows. The proud cities of old wisdom that astonished so many became empty skeletons of molten rock and hidden treasures guarded by fear and intrigue. Some foolish knights that called themselves holy even sought to harvest the knowledge of this fallen age and only achieved in waging wars and endless slaughter that lasted for generations. In this unforeseen future, a girl with tangled fox brown hair was waking from her sleep in a small sunny bedroom for two.

The first chapter preview: You all must have heard of a particular military magic instructress that has way too much power, an elementary overview over the battlefield tactics, and we all like to think of her as a sweet character even thou she's sometimes kind of rough around the edges. Some nasty tongues of military brass would even say that she's a little too perfect and to dangerous to be efficiently integrated into modern warfare, but they just say things because they are tiered and drowning in paperwork.

The truth is that this perfect soldier girl is far from being perfect, which shows in her everyday life as a serious workaholic syndrome, a professional deformation of a too excellent drill instructor, and some seriously bad cooking skills … I mean come on, by all Belkan nobility that rot in their graves _(respectfully)_, who can boil vegetables like a well-bred English granny nowadays, I beg of you!? Well, this social glitch is immediately followed by a popular guys' rumor of her sexual orientation which, if true, is definitely a no-go for raising a child of such importance as Vivio!

So how will this great young captain Nanoha Takamachi, the Ace of aces, with all her friends being constantly busy with their own important jobs, cope with all the ups and downs of adulthood and military bureaucracy that never ceases to amaze people with its self restriction and complicity? The answers to all that and more shall await you in the next chapter of The Legend of Lyrics-The Gained present … maybe.


	2. Chapter 2

**The**** Gained Present**

The girl was a pretty young woman in her last years of teenage life. Her head still on her pillow, she started opening her round blue eyes, with their charming purple shades playing in the morning display of shadow and splendid yellow sunshine that was intruding into the bedroom trough a large attic window besides her bed. The bed itself was quite large, ruling over a whole corner of the room beside a yellow fence and a thick juniper tree standing tall beside her cowered legs like a watchful guardian. Over her head, there was a large board nailed to a blue wall, and on it, there were many large pictures of her younger self and a shy looking girl with long golden locks and gentle dark eyes that never quite looked directly into the camera. There were many others too, showing the first girl's family and her primary school friends, and many more that she must have chosen with great care and probably watched sometimes in silence, filled with all those vivid memories of her past adventures.

The girl herself was of eastern heritage, meaning that her almond shaped eyes and her comely round face were betraying her to be from Earth, or more precisely from Non-Administrated Planet-97, where her birth place was probably Japan or one of other eastern coastal countries. But apart from her face, she, with her walnut brown hair and soft blue irises more resembled the people of the west that the east, where such eyes were more of an exception that a normal rule, although only one to count with many others that followed this particular young woman in her everyday life.

She has already fully awakened and was now standing besides her bed, dressing herself in her usual military dress of white and purple in front of a large mirror. The clock that was standing on a bed table was silenced even before it started to scream in its usual morning glory, that would probably wake up the whole house. She has probably decided to let a little girl that had been sleeping close beside her sleep a little more. A few hours later, their housemaid Aina would come upstairs to wake her up for breakfast, but for now …

The girl searched the bed and spotted a big wolfish puppy of cinnamon red hair sleeping like dead besides the little girl's feet.

"Arf, please, I'm off" she gently touched the dog with her hand so that it opened its sleepy blue eyes and yawned like crazy into the blinding morning sunlight, that caught into a little red jewel that decorated its forehead.

The dog spoke with a playful woman's voice that sounded slow and damp from sleep: Aaaaaaaaa-Hm … Ah, Nanoha, going already?"

"Yeah, we start it early with the recruits you know," the girl replied while tying her red tie.

"Oh, look at the time. So it isn't the middle of the night right now," the dog yawned while glancing at the clock that was showing 6:30.

"That is what I am trying to tell you Arf," she hurried explaining, lowering her voice down not to wake the sleeping child. " … I'm going now, so can you take care of business while I'm gone?"

"Like the usual," the dog replied and stretched herself on the blanket. Then she crawled up the bed and curled herself besides the little girl's chest.

"And remember, if you need me, I'll be on the training grounds, the staging area, not the training field, right."

"Yea, yea, go break a leg or something," the dog muttered from below her thick little tail and already fallen fast asleep, with a child's palm stretched on her furry hide.

"Ah, I'm glad we at least have Aina to rely on. Can't imagine how Fate managed to make your attitude thou."

The girl made some final adjustments on her clothing and hair, then took something from a little pillow on the night table and she was off, hurrying to the training grounds to prepare the terrain for her new recruits.

*

The staging area was basking it the morning sun and the breeze was carrying with it a salty fragrance of the sea nearby. The region was in truth an abandoned port that was now only used by the military for the training purposes. With its wide area entangled with a whole variety of spells for monitoring and matter manipulation that could successfully replicate almost any terrain and allow the user a complete control over its environment and inhabitants, this was the closest thing you could get to simulate a battle outside a true battlefield. The inhabitants were mostly comprised of recruits themselves, running and swirling over the air in a shape of small and slightly disorganized bands of green mages, hardly able to adapt on the ever changing flow of a real engagement.

One of them, a mage with short straw colored hair and standard Barrier jacket of dark grey-blue and cyan green was scurrying rapidly across the cold morning air. His golden staff with cyan green orb was hanging uselessly in his clenched arm, devoid of all urge to counter his unseen attacker. All he wanted now was to escape two rapidly closing balls of volatile pink magic that seemed to be gaining speed with each of his desperate turns.

Another mage, a dark haired one with smart blue eyes and a beak shaped nose dared to attack in the shade of his comrade's distraction.

His combat staff cried: "Snipe Shot!"

A thin ray of blue magic rushed from its forked head towards the skies in a furious swirl and pounced towards its prey like a soaring arrow … only to be shot down by another, this one a flash of pink, like so many others that pestered his tiered combatant.

The projectile that clashed with his seemed undazzled by the collision that so easily shattered his hopes of retaliation, and was now redirecting its interest towards the mage himself. He bravely decided to confront it, his left arm erected towards the incoming magical bullet … A blue barrier was broken almost instantly, leaving the pink orb a free path to the mage's quick demise.

His comrade saw what happened and lost the sight of his second pursuer that flew above him and trough his defenses, with the first one following a split second later.

"Bradley, Cheroll, you're out!"

The gentle jet commanding voice belonged to the girl we met in her bed, known more precisely as a top notch battle instructor, Captain Nanoha Takamachi. She was flying, her magical wings spread wide open, over rows of broken second floor windows on a wider city street, lined with battered buildings. This was supposed to simulate a theoretical situation in an urban conflict zone that the TSA intelligence predicted would result in an all out conflict with the Gadget Drones or some other Lost Logia raiders.

A barrage of blue magic came and missed and came again, forcing her to slightly switch her position to a higher ground beyond the street's roofs.

"Axel Shooter, shoot!"

Another four orbs of pink magic flew from the golden head of her magical stave and two ended in hard pursuit of two areal mages, trying desperately to loose them in between the shattered windows and got painfully hit in the process.

"Don't try to avoid it trough there! Face them in the open air! You two don't have the experience to fly like that right now!"

"We're extremely sorry ma'am," the soldiers replied with their bowed heads, while they were slowly flying to the ground, trying to hide the pain around their lower portions of their bodies.

"Next time, I want you two to be up in the air above me so that the sun will provide you with some initial coverage from the shooter's sight, but be prepared to loose that advantage once he or she switches to mind control over the bullets!"

"Yes ma'am!" they saluted and slowly progressed to the place for the downed recruits, where other misfortunate mages already waited and tended to their first bruises recieved from Nanoha and her Raising Heart.

She then focused on defending against a small magical salvo with a Round Shield, and finally on hunting down the last remaining two that were still stubbornly clinging to the air …

A few minutes later, all were assembled on the ground where they formed a straight line as they always did at the beginning and the end of each and every exercise, while she softly landed up front and began with her lecturing:

She took a long breath: "First of all, Bradley, Cheroll, if you are going to try and distract me, then use a more fitting technique next time. I admit that Snipe Shot can be very useful in all kinds of situations, but not against strong barriers and shields which can deflect it pretty easily. Moreover, Cheroll, Snipe Shot can be conjured in less than a third of the time you took to conjure yours, so with all that time on your hands, I expect at least a Blaze Cannon from you, alright. Oh, and Bradley, we have a long way to fly with your current maneuverability and battlefield awareness, so expect even more of my bullets focusing on you in the future."

"Sir!" the boys saluted.

She stopped and looked upon the two mages still tending to their wounds with signs of tiered pain on their faces: "Bronson, Charles, do not try some similar stunt in our future exercises. We have just begun to practice our air maneuvers, so don't go jumping in and out of the windows just jet or you'll get more than just bruises in real combat the way you're doing it."

She paused again and turned to the last pair of mages, an average looking girl with short brown hair and an enthusiastic expression, paired with a calm guy of raven hair, looking into the world with a pair of composed grey eyes: "So, the last but not least, Seele and Stans. You have a slightly better awareness than the others, but your duo is far from being the most cooperative one on the field, so try and improve your cooperation a little, and next time, you to can use a little more powerful attacks on me. Don't worry, I'll be alright. It's just that I know you can and will use such attacks in real combat, so don't hold back in the training field because of me."

With the lecturing done, her expression softened a little from that of a serious military instructor to that of a school teacher: "So, can anyone tell me why you couldn't defeat me today?"

… Silence …

"Isn't there anyone?"

"Sir," answered the girl mage:" I believe that you are too strong for us to handle."

"And why is that, private Seele?" Nanoha inquired.

"Sir, we are inspiring to be A level mages ..."

"So you think it is the power difference that keeps you from winning?"

The girl hesitated for a moment. She was only a little younger than Nanoha, but looking in those purple blue eyes made her feel younger than she wanted to admit. As she answered, she kept her gaze lowered to the floor: "Among other things, sir."

"It's true that I am a higher ranking mage than you, but that is why you should have been working as a team, not as pairs, but as a team. That was the main reason for your defeat today."

"But sir, you instructed us to work in pairs," Bradley sounded confused.

"Yes, I did order you to work in pairs of two mages," smiled Nanoha: "But I never forbade you to work as a team too, did I. So next time when we fight, I expect you all to know your partner's good and bad sides, and how to work as a team against me and Raging Heart, understood?"

Squad: "Yes Ma'am!"

"Good," she smiled again. "Class dismissed!"

*

After she took care of everything at the staging grounds, she was once again walking down the seaside road, back to the personnel living facilities. She already undone her Barrier Jacket and was in her normal uniform with a small red pearl hanging around her neck.

She turned her attention to the pearl: "Have you saved today's combat data, Raising Heart?"

It answered in her usual reassuring tones: "It has been done."

"Our recruits are progressing well, don't you think."

"I agree with my master," answered the Raising Heart.

Nanoha sighted and looked up to the pure blue sky: "They remind me a little on those days we shared with Hayate's Strikers you know. These fights bring back some nostalgic memories." Then she looked back at the gray sea and a naughty thought ran trough her lips: "Next time, we shall prepare a little surprise for them to see if they learned anything from our past training, and we still have the afternoon exercises in store for them … Ah, I hope they will bond a little eventually, and grow into excellent areal mages someday."

Raising Heart: "It will be done. They have an excellent teacher."

Nanoha, cheerfully: "Thank you Raising Heart, but I would not be able to do these things without your support, so the praise for raising good mages goes to both of us."

The pearl said nothing. It just gleamed a little on the morning sun and bounced a few times on her chest as they proceeded into the familiar neighborhood.

Aina was already done with her cleaning when she returned and was downstairs cooking lunch in the kitchen. She found Arf in a shape of a little girl with long cinnamon red hair sitting behind the dining table and cutting bean pods into a large black pot. Her white tipped dog ears immediately turned sidewise as she entered trough the door from the hallway, followed by her little face that bore a foxy expression that she couldn't quite read, not because it was hard, but because Arf was a big furry simpleton by her big furry heart that got happy and excited by all the little things in life that others took for granted.

"I'm home!" she called into the kitchen from where she received a welcoming greeting from the busy housemaid.

"Welcome home Nanoha!" greeted the dog girl and threw a bean pod into the pot, "I'm helping with beans!"

"I see. Is Vivio still in school?"

"Jap, she has a long one today, poor thing. I don't understand what are those Saint Church doofuses thinking, making her stay there till three o'clock!"

"She has club activities today. Besides, there were even longer school days from where I come from, not to mention prep schools and cram schools after that."

"Huh, no wonder you became so tough!" whistled Arf and threw jet another bean pod onto the growing green pile. She was still smiling and her dog ears were pointing up and twisting like antennae. Nanoha grabbed them with the tips of her fingers and gave them a gentle twist, so that the dog girl gave out a little bark of content.

"So, what is it Arf? You're hiding something."

"Me? I would never, ai-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta …" her feigned disbelief was quickly dispelled by another twist of her ears.

"Sure you wouldn't. Now tell me, what happened that made you so happy so early in the morning? Usually you sleep like dead until it's time for breakfast and then sleep some more until lunch, and last time you smiled like that was the time you and Vivio threw poor Zafira into the leak with translocation magic."

"Well, he _was_ snoring so terribly down on the hot beach, so we thought that he needed a little refreshment," the girl turned her smiling face upward to face Nanoha's, with her two white rows of needle-sharp teeth exposed from her big smile. "… But if you are so desperate to know …" She leaned even closer to Nanoha's face, her own one now a mask of sly confidentiality, and whispered ever so silently: "He's coming to visit."

"… What? Who?" asked Nanoha, confused by her strange announcement.

"You know."

"No I don't. Arf, please tell me, who's coming?"

Arf's face elongated into a shinny smile even further: "Mr. Head Librarian!"

" … Eeeeeee! Yuuno?!" reared Nanoha in confusion: "… But I thought that he … on that seminar about ancient architecture … that he'll be there this whole week!"

"They quit early. Something came up. Don't know … Anyway, he said he's going to relocate himself to Clanagan for a day or two and that he's got some free time on his hands until they arrange everything and all, so he asked if he could stop by for a short visit."

"Arf, wait a minute! What came up? Is there a Lost Logia involved? What arrangements? Is he going somewhere again? … Wait a minute, you said yes?!"

"Well, what could I do? It's been an eternity since we all have last seen each other, and I thought that you will be glad to see him too," answered the dog girl.

"And when is he coming?" asked Nanoha as if she would already know the answer to the question.

Arf took a sneak peek at the clock on the wall and thought for a moment: "If you hurry back from your afternoon training, you can get dressed into something more casual by the time he arrives, but I think he would be just as glad seeing you in your Barrier Jacket if you ask me."

She didn't thou, and by the time her ears stopped tinning from her usual subdued complaining and fidgeting about the matter, they got a call from the maid, announcing that the lunch is almost ready to be served on the table.

*

As she walked, Nanoha was thinking about the upcoming visit. She hasn't seen Yuuno since he departed on some planet to participate in an archeological seminar and had to inspect some ancient Belkan ruins before that. In these passing years he became an expert on Lost Logia related matter and shared relevant historical knowledge with other scientists and even with the military. You could even say that he and his kind were, with their knowledge and expertise, the first and the last line of defense against the ever growing crime connected with the artifact legacy of the Al Hazard, the world that consumed itself by its own technological power. However she and Yuuno went back a long time, way before she became a military instructor and he a renowned manager of the Infinite Library. Looking back, he was the original reason that she even became a magician in the first place … A picture suddenly popped in her head, the one that she taped on her wall and which represented her as a fifteen years old girl with a golden green eyed ferret sitting straight on her right shoulder. Back then he was always by her side, protecting her back in every battle over the Lost Logia, but now, they are barely able to see each other, and it wasn't just Yuuno …

*

An hour and a half later, she was running along the path that she walked in the morning, Raising Heart swinging violently on her hard-breathing chest.

"Geez, I'm late! Those recruits never learn it the easy way, do they! I never thought we would have to elongate the training for thirty minutes! This is bad! It will be close!"

*

Arf was seated on a large cushy chair in the living room, her legs swinging in the air with excitement. Opposite to her, a tall young man was seated on a small sofa beside a long window.

He had a gentle face with big jade green eyes behind a pair of thin circular glasses that made him look like a genuine scholar. They wore their usual soft expression that worked in tandem with his reserved smile, which both shrouded his person with an aura of warmth and kindness. His straight golden hair was tied into a ponytail on his back, but many locks still managed to find their way on his face to cover up his ears and eyebrows.

He wore his usual working attire: A dark green suit and a thin red tie, bounded by a golden medallion.

He and Arf were just talking something about the tribal food when the main doors were blasted wide open and Nanoha busted on the hallway, breathing heavily from her long run.

"I'm … home."

"Hello Nanoha, how's your training?" answered Arf from the living room.

"Like … usual. They … can't … seem … to understand … the meaning … of cooperation … until you beat it … in them … and they take … dual teamwork … as a personal challenge …"

She paused for a moment, catching her breath, then she continued: "But they are showing promise. Cherrol is definitely the team's leader, while Bradley is his right hand and shield. Seele is quick and a fairly good shooter, Stans is also good, but more tactical and not so straightforward … He and Bronson would make a good support team, while Charles shows potential as a Front Attacker, but has some trouble with defense and maneuverability. Well, I have fait that they could manage to take on a few rogue mages by now … Or some stronger Gadget Drones for that matter."

"Hoho! Looking forward to their performance then!" Arf laughed from around the corner.

"Looks like you were having fun," said a familiar voice.

First she looked a little confused, but then her face bloomed into a warm smile, her tardiness and sweat completely forgotten: "Yuuno!"

She hurried half the way to the living room, but then she remembered that she is still in her training uniform and instead of entering, she only honored the guest with her head popping from around the corner of the room's entrance.

"Just wait there for a minute!" she startled him with her commanding voice.

"There is no need to rush because of ..."

"Just a minute! Then you must tell me everything!"

"… Sure, take your time," he smiled at her and scratched behind his head with his right arm in embarrassment. She could be very bossy sometimes.

"Don't fall down the stairs! I will make sure that this ferret boy won't go anywhere while you are changing you clothes!" shouted the dog girl behind her fading footsteps that vanished in the first floor. She could still hear Yunno's objections about his unfortunate alias and Arf's teasing all the way to her room.

"Come on Arf, I rarely change into a ferret now, so you can stop calling me like that," he protested.

"So you do change sometimes! Better not be for spying on girls, or Nanoha will be very cross … You know, she came so fast from work just to get dressed for the occasion.

"She shouldn't have! I would gladly wait for her rather than seeing her discomforted like that."

"Be grateful!" with crossed arms and legs on the chair and a wise frown on her face, Arf looked just like an experienced old man: "There are not many things that could turn Nanoha away from her work with the recruits and you are one of them!"

"Arf," he sounded amazed by her wisdom.

"So the best thing to do is to make her running worth wile, like …"

"Like?"

"… Like taking us out on some ice cream or to some coffee shop. I know a perfect place … Oh, and we must not forget Vivio too!"

"Eee-he-he-he, by us, don't you mean you, Arf?" he knew it sounded to wise to be Arf.

"Don't be a fool! You will need me as a navigator! The streets around here are like a maze and city is always crowded at this hour, so you can't orientate properly, and that is when I stand in! I have all the sweet shops of Clanagan in the tip of my nose!"

"I see," he watched her as she proudly touched her nose with her index finger like it was the greatest of them all.

"Of course it will only cost you some money, but still better than dragging poor Nanoha around aimlessly in this heat."

"I wonder," he sounded skeptical. If he remembered properly, Arf always had a wolf's appetite for all things sweet or not."

"I'm back!"

His dance with the sweets-hungry wolf was finally interrupted by Nanoha's appearance. He looked up froze.

She was wearing a white dress that reminded him a little on her high school uniform with its long and fluffy white skirt. Above the skirt, a soft black belt went round her waist and formed a lovely ribbon on her belly. The dress exposed the untanned skin of her slim arms and chest in the shape of a slick V, that uncovered just a little of her nicely shaped breasts with Raising Heart ever present in the middle. She decided to untie her long brown hair for the occasion, and were now laying loose on her back and shoulders.

"Do I look alright?" she approached shyly, her hands on the skirt, drifting it absently from left to right.

With a superior use of willpower, Yuuno managed to answer her question: "A-a-a-a-a-absolutely. You l-l-look nice."

"Ah, I'm glad! I thought for a while that I may have looked too fat in it, but when I saw it in the store, I remembered my old school uniform and I just had to try it on," she explained happily while she swung on her heels one last time, her skirt gracefully following her moves. "I never wore it before thou, but when Arf said that you are inviting us out, I kind of thought it was the right time to try it on before my first experimental subjects."

"Sure … I invited you out?" he turned to look suspiciously at the dog girl who quickly turned elsewhere and was suddenly preoccupied with something on the ceiling.

"Yes, on the line. Is something wrong?" she looked a little concerned, but as he watched her worry in her new summer dress, her eyebrows arced so familiarly, he couldn't possibly tell her that it was probably the familiar's sugar lust that conceived such a plan.

"E-e-e-e … oh, yes!" he scratched behind his head: "I mentioned if you would care to go out on some ice cream or something like that. It must have slipped my mind while I was talking with _Arf_."

"You must not forget such things, Yuuno," she raised a finger at him. Then she suddenly got very close to his face: "On the other hand, you do seem somehow unwell. You face is a little blushed. Are you sure you should be walking outside on this heat right now?"

"_There is nothing to worry about, I can assure you. I'm completely fine_!" he reassured her in a speedy manner, but to no avail. Next thing he felt was her arm going trough his hair and her forehead touching his. He felt her warm breath on his face.

"You do seem fine," she said after a moment, but you're still red. You sure it's not better for you to rest for a while?"

"_I'm_ _completely fine, don't worry … It's just … it's just a little hot, that's all_," he said with a shaking voice. "… _Emmm, Nanoha_?"

"Yes?" Their eyes met for a moment.

"… _You can let go now if you want_."

"… Oh, I'm so sorry!" she exploded, rearing away with all her might, her cheeks blushing: "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hold you so long, I …"

"Hey you two birdies!" Arf sounded irritated: "Are we going to get some ice cream or are we gonna play doctors all day?!"

"Oh, sorry Arf. We should better get going now," Nanoha again turned to Yuuno, visually relieved by her intervention.

"Yeah," he nodded and lifted himself from the sofa: "We should get going."

"Aina, we're going out for a while! We will bring Vivio along with us, so you don't have to worry about that!" Nanoha shouted along the corridor that led from the kitchen to the backyard.

Yuuno turned to the doors with the dog girl right behind him, and opened them so she could jump out in what looked to be a start of a hot and sunny afternoon: "Well, lead the way Arf."

"Rodger!" she saluted with the saluting arm on her pointy little nose and with her cinnamon tail moving wildly. "He-he, when you see how good I am, you will consider giving me a double portion!"

*

Belkan Saint Church magic school was a peaceful place, surrounded by lush greenery of Midchildan Central massive that made it somehow distant from all the buzzing of the Clanagan capital. Behind its tall brick walls was a large park that encircled the facility, where bush-lined ways guided the visitors straight to the main entrance, or led running children on their P. E. classes around the building without getting lost in its seemingly frightening hugeness. But however twisted and lined with greenery they were, all the ways eventually ended in the front of the main gates, where a large fountain marked the central gathering spot for all the excursions and parents, who came to pick up their kids from their respectful offices in downtown. There, some of the parents have already gathered, sitting in the cool shade of the fountain, or asserting themselves under a large terrass that topped over the entrance on two broad supporting columns of white marble. Of all those overheated visitors, three figures especially caught the attention: A slender young scholar in dark green suit standing absently in the shade of the falling water, a little girl with a big white hat and a cinnamon summer skirt who was playfully leaning towards it, and a young woman in white who was sitting text to the man, smiling happily while listening to something he had to say, her hands resting peacefully behind her back.

"So they found another," she asked, her face suddenly concerned.

"So it seems. It is another burial site of Ancient Belka, that's for sure, but they told me that they have never seen anything like it before, so they asked for my personal opinion, and the opinion of other archeologists" explained Yuuno … "What so funny?"

"Nothing," Nanoha shook her head: "It's just that you seem so happy explaining these things that it makes me happy too."

"Oh, am I bothering you, I'm sorry," he blushed and looked away.

"No–no, I didn't mean that. You explain me all you want about these new ruins. I want to know it too. How they lived back then and how they used magic … even more so because of Vivio … and the Lost Logia. What were they thinking, seeking such power, only to destroy and tamper the dreams of others?" Then she looked at him in apology: "I'm sorry. Now I must be boring you with all my sentimental ways of looking at history."

"Not at the slightest! Even I ask myself these questions sometimes, when we discover a new Lost Logia or a shallow grave, full of skeletons of Belkan knights, still wearing their battle attire and weapons like they fell only yesterday. Are they telling us from beyond the grave not to repeat the same mistakes as they did?"

"Yuuno, I didn't know you were thinking like that."

"Archeology is one of the reasons why our tribe refused to wear Intelligent Devices after all, or so our tribesmen speak. I got your Raising Heart accidentally, as a gift, once when my father took me to an antique fair and I hid it from him."

"You never told me that either!" she whined unhappily. She turned to the little pear on her chest: "Raising Heart, is it true?"

"Yes, my master," it answered in her usual way, as if it was just another everyday question concerning their training.

"_Geez_, you two have been cowering each other on this for years, haven't you! Now I get the feeling that you two know each other better than I do!" she crossed her arms on her chest in fake anger, and made a face.

"Now, now, it's not like that. It's just that we never remembered to tell you it's all," he raised his hands in defense.

"Hmph, and what else did you _not remember_ to tell me, Yuuno Scrya?" she turned to him in her lecturing mode. "Tell me, I don't want to have any such secrets with you two."

His face turned red all of the suddenly, and he started playing with his fingers: "Well, I can't tell you everything …"

"Yes, why don't you tell us something, Yuuno?" Arf brought her plate to the party. "You can start by who do you like better, Nanoha, or Fate? And then Nanoha can tell you which color are the underwear she wears … that of course, if you don't already know. You were a ferret at their house after all."

"Arf!" she barked at the dog girl in disguise.

"I-I never watched!" Yuuno reassured quickly, waving with his arms to support his statement.

"What?" Arf asked Nanoha: "You said no secrets."

DING-DANG-DONG!

The bell announced the end of school activities for today and made a quick end on the perilous subject. The first kids were starting to emerge, hurrying from the cool entrance hall onto the hot summer air, followed by the slower ones that were still half way engaged in their loud childish conversations.

"Ah, there she is!" Nanoha stood up and waved her arm: "Oooj, Vivio, we're here! Vivio!"

There was some movement among the children and a little blonde girl started running towards them, calling her stepmother along the way. She had one eye a color of jade and the other a strange mix of red and brown that passed for the color of red vine. She wore pigtails and a happy smile that matched the glow of her sunshine bleached hair.

She fell into her stepmother's embrace and started telling her something that happened in school when she noticed Yuuno and ran to embrace him too.

"Yuuno!" she jumped into him. "How are you?!"

"Just fine, thanks. How are you doing Vivio? It seems that you have grown a little since when we last met."

"You are just saying that. My mommy always tells me that I am small because I don't eat enough peas and spinach."

"You should listen to your mommy. She knows what is right for you," he messed up her hair.

"Uuuuu," she let out a whine of disappointment: "She probably made you say that."

"No she didn't. I know it, because I ate a lot of them when I was little and I grew this big," he straightened himself to emphasize his statement.

She looked a little more hopeful: "Really?"

"Really," he nodded and smiled at her.

"And if Vivio will promise to eat all her veggies properly, I may consider telling her where are we going now," Arf popped on her feet from the side of the fountain.

"Where are we going?" asked the little girl.

"First promise, secrets later" was Arf being strict.

"Oh alright, I promise, now tell me!" was she curious.

"He-he, we're going to a sweet shop and my nose will lead you there," Arf announced with an air of importance.

Vivio was overjoyed: "Really, mommy, are we really going to a sweet shop?!"

"Yes Vivio, we are going to a sweet shop. In fact, Yuuno is taking us so you should thank him first," Nanoha put the hands on her stepdaughter's shoulders and silently whispered in her ear.

Vivio then stepped in front of Yuuno and bowed her head: "Thank you mister, for taking us to the sweet shop. I am very glad."

"That's my girl," Nanoha put a hand on her head and embraced her.

Suddenly a teacher came from the building and went towards the group at the fountain: "Excuse me, but she forgot her workbook under the desk."

He handed Yuuno a thin black book warped in plastic, that carried a big yellow name: Magic and magical laws for the beginners. By Erol Beckwagen.

"So," the teacher corrected his glasses: "You must be Vivio's father. We haven't seen you around on the parent's meetings. Tough job, I presume?"

"Well, I'm not exactly Vivio's father, you see …" Yuuno smiled politely at the teacher.

"Oh?" he again corrected his glasses, and moved his face closely to Yuuno's: "Oh, I see. Well, you certainly look like it thou sir and," he once again corrected his glasses: "If I may be so rude as to point it out, you four with the lovely ladies sure look like a family … Well …" once last he corrected his glasses: "Life sure is a big mystery, isn't it sir. Now, if you will pray excuse me, I have a demon or two to catch with my tweezers." And he rushed away, back from where he came, leaving the group in a slightly confused atmosphere.

"What was his problem anyway?" asked Arf and shrugged like a wise guy: "Too much teaching seems to leave a mark, doesn't it … Anyway, who wants some ice cream?!"

*

Vivio and Nanoha walked hand in hand on an almost deserted avenue. It was already late and city lights were starting to turn on to color an early twilight with their soft artificial shine. Some fireflies were playing in the nearby bushes that decorated some of the suburban gardens.

"That was fun, wasn't it?"

"Yeah," answered the little girl. She was watching the fireflies now and was little distracted by them. She loved this kind of summer nights, so warm and bright, with stars and city lights, nothing to be afraid of in the soft darkness, buzzing with secret nocturnal lives of insects. She loved them as long as she could remember, to the border of her present self and beyond, to the misty memories of the Saint. "But I wish I could stay out a little longer, like Arf."

"You know you can't, Vivio. Little girls like yourself need to be in bed by eight. You know what happens when you stay up late. Then you can't get up in the morning and you sleep the whole day off, just like Arf does it."

"I could wake up early like that for a day or two," was she stubborn.

"Yes but then you'd be gloomy for a whole day and you wouldn't do anything except yawning and complaining that you're tiered … Besides, even if she doesn't look like it, Arf is a big girl and can take care of herself, and even she can't stay out all night long. I only allowed her to stay this time because she escorted Yuuno to the hotel."

Suddenly Vivio turned from the fireflies to her stepmother: "Why must Yuuno leave again?"

"He has something important to do. He's a busy man."

"I whish he could stay."

"Me too Vivio, me too."

"My homeroom teacher said he looked like my daddy."

"…Oh, you were listening to that," Nanoha sounded a little awkward.

"My friends at school are always talking about their daddies, how they save lives as enforcers, or how they work in the navigation bureau and pilot great starships or something like that … But they think you're great too mommy." She added that sentence to comfort her. Most of her friends did think that her mommy was great thou, but still, when it came down to the influence and jobs, daddies were always the thumb cards of any conversation.

"Thank you Vivio. You see, having a daddy or not is not so important … Well, it is, but it is more important that your parents loves you, whoever they are, and your mommy loves you more than anything on the whole world."

Vivio smiled at that and pressed herself closer to Nanoha. They walked in silence for a little longer, then she said: "Could someday Yuuno become my daddy, just like you did?"

That was another awkward thing to say.

"Well, you see Vivio, there are may complicated matters involving that that you'll understand when you are a little bit older. Firs of all, you can't be adopted by two different persons like that."

"You mean that Yuuno and Nanoha would have to get married if they both wanted to adopt me?"

"… Well, technically … yes," answered Nanoha. This had to be one of those days when everything just went its own way with no stopping to ask her for directions. Things just happened by themselves and she felt incredibly hopeless, standing in the middle of all that.

Vivio started to giggle.

"What is it?"

"Mommy, you look funny," she said and giggled some more.

"I do?"

"Yes … your face … mommy … I never saw you like that before … You look like a … like a … Dreamy rhinoceros!"

Nanoha smiled too and messed up Vivio's hair. Then she hugged her with one arm as close as she could: "Come here you little mischief you. Mommy rhinoceros will take you home and make you a nice hot rhinoceros bath."

*

Arf was standing on the doorstep of a large glass cowered front of a classy hotel. Beyond the rotary gates, inside of its shiny interior, a few guests were sitting in a large and comfortable reception, decorated with white leather. Yuuno was just about to enter trough the gates and was turning back to say goodbye to the familiar.

"You sure you don't need any help? Nanoha said that you can take me with you if you feel like it. I don't have as much power in me as I did before, but I can still kick a couple of Gadget drones' but if I want!"

"Thanks Arf, but I think it won't be necessary," he answered. "Besides, there will be many enforcers who will protect the expedition."

"As you wish," shrugged the dog girl: "… But I still think you should get yourself a familiar. You have at least as much magic as an A or an S, yet I have never saw you use anything greater than a bind before. So creating a familiar that would cower it up for you and guarded your back would be wise, don't you think. You can't say it would be hard on you, you're the boss of the Infinite Library for crying out loud!"

He smiled mildly and scratched the back of his head: "Well, I don't know much about familiars thou and I don't really know if I would like to create one myself. It sounds like a lot of work and a great responsibility … and I have a lot of work on my hands … besides, I don't really know if I could be a proper master to him … or her."

"Tc! You're always such a whimp, you know that," she looked disappointed.

"Well, that's who I am."

She smiled like a naughty wolf: "Yep, but we still like you, don't forget that and return in one piece, or someone will be very sad." Then she came a little closer and said with a quieter voice: "You know, I'm kinda relieved you came ... There is a rumor in the military that Nanoha and Fate are … you know."

"E?"

"You know, are that."

"What?"

"… A couple."

"E-e-e-e-e?"

"Yap, e-e-e-e-e it is, and when the brass heard of it, they went ballistic and demanded that the asset is taken away from her care. That's how they officially call Vivio: An irreplaceable asset for future development of Lost Logia based military technology. But don't go spreading this around. It's a secret and only a few of the Belkan Saint Church members and some Main Branch officers know about. So anyway, they claimed that if the rumor is proven true, Vivio is to be taken away and placed into military care. Their reason was that it is not healthy for a Saint to be raised in such a provocative environment. They even got some of the Saint Church members to side with them."

"I never knew! Was Nanoha alright?"

"She was very frustrated by it, and so was Fate. So she decided to go away for a while and used the opportunity to board a dimensional warship with her staff, so that thinks could cool down while she was gone."

"And they did?"

"Yes, the rumors eventually subsided and the brass went a little silent again, but you can still hear suggestions about the Saint and her future development on a daily basis." She then bowed unexpectedly: "I'm sorry that I used you a little. I knew that our comm line was being bugged, well, we all did, and I figured that they would stop pushing it for a while if you would come for a visit. Will you forgive me?"

"Of course Arf. I'm glad that my visit helped Vivio and Nanoha."

"Thanks. It won't happen again, I promise … Well, maybe sometimes, cause you're such a whimp!"

"I'm glad I can be of service ..." he looked at the clock in the hotel and back to the familiar: "I must go now. I have a meeting with one of the expedition's archeologists and a few technicians, so take care Arf and guard those two well."

"Yeah, me to. Goodbye then. See you later."

"Goodbye."

The doors of the hotel started to turn as he started to walk on its shiny grey floor. It reflected many bright lights that shined bright on a high white ceiling. He noticed that the hotel's staff tried to make them look like stars above Midchilda. They were a little off, but who really cared about those things nowadays anyway. A little sigh slipped from his lips. So this was another goodbye.

_I just wish they were here too_.

*

The next chapter preview:

Arf: Hu-hu, Yuuno, we got so much paper time in this chapter that it makes up for a whole third season! How much did you get back then? Two or three scenes? I only got one!

Yuuno: Yeah.

Arf: Don't just yeah me you sneaky little ferret! Who wanted to spend more air time with Nanoha and was feeling down because he couldn't, A!?

Yuuno: ...

Arf: Tc! Well anyway, because we got so much paper time, the writer here said we have to read the preview too!

Arf & Yuuno: (_Reading_)

Arf: WHAT! You get even more paper time in the next chapter, while I probably won't appear at all!!! Oj, Cat, watch what you're writing you punk!

Yuuno: Now, now Arf, they are ruins after all and I am an archeologist.

Arf: Who cares about the ruins! I want to be on the scene too, and it's all your fault for not taking me with you!

Yuuno: Now, now, don't make such a big mess out of our preview. The readers must have been bewildered by this chapter already, because it was so different from the introduction, so you don't have to scare them even more.

Arf: Scare them?! I'm fighting for their rights here! Every reader should have the right to imagine at least one girl with animal ears a chapter, they are popular these days ... He-he-he, at least those goody-goody knights won't show up any time soon. I bet Zafira won't get any paper time at all. That mangy mutt, he had more air time than me, and all because he's on Hayate's team, grrrrrr!

Yuuno (_With Arf in the background_): (_Sigh_) Next time on the Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha-The Legend of Lyrics: The Tomb of Three ... You can stop now Arf, we're done reading.


End file.
